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Comment by vbtemp | Hacker News Reader

Agile, "SCRUM", and daily "stand ups" are the worst thing to have happened to me during my career. In the mid 2010s they started to become a serious thing, and my career/work satisfaction really steadily declined.

Now, I only work in teams and projects that are pointedly non-Agile, non-SCRUM, without anyone holding a title of "SCRUM Master". My love of software development is coming back, and it really feels great.

Every time I interview for a job, the only time I permit myself one foul-language word, is when I make the point that "I'm not going to work in an Agile team, I'm too old for that shit". When what follows is an awkward, silent few moments, I know it isn't going to work out. When what follows is enthusiasm and agreement (happening more and more these days) I know we're on the right track to do great work together.

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I've also hated that trend. Ill preface this with the caveat that I'm extremely biased against PMs.

What we've seen is the birth of a new profession, "Project Manager" (Agile/Scrum); and its filled by a ton of people who read a travel brochure size sheet of paper detailing how to be one and that's how they all operate, all while demanding outsized pay for the "skill" (really if they were paid minimum wage that's still too much)

They take zero consideration for team structure, working dynamic, the business that the org is operating in and tries to shove every uniquely shaped team into a square peg.

What's more annoying is that I've seen some hardcore PM run shop promoting project managers into people managers, often overseeing highly technical teams while they themselves not being technical which leads to all sort of pain and cost to the the ICs they oversee.

Agile has managed to 'codify' middle management, very poorly.

Agile is exactly the corporate management hellscape that, circa 2000, the Agile Manifesto authors explicitly sought to subvert. Things from Office Space (1999) have come exactly full circle.

I agree w/ you broadly but I want to add a counterpoint that a great PM/TPM is worth their weight in gold.

We lost one on our team and immediately we were worse off. Having someone who can unblock engineers by making and updating trackers, knowing who to talk to to get projects unblocked, and having a larger view of things sped us up so much. (Which I'm sure is why he got ferreted away to a very important project for the company ;)

> without anyone holding a title of "SCRUM Master"

I always wondered why small teams need anyone dedicated exclusively to be a "scrum master". Outside regular meetings and checking the project board once or twice a day, what is their purpose?

I would much rather have another dev in the team.

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